I’m at the office in Hong Kong Central today which happens a few times a month. Getting lunch here is always interesting. Around noon a few thousand people descend from the skyscrappers and pack into the restaurants that fill each nook and cranny of the streets.
At typical seat-yourself joints, you take whatever seat is available. You don’t wait for a table to open up because one won’t. You’ll be standing there until after 2:00 PM if you do. Instead, you share with whoever happens to already be sitting at the table. The close quarters and sheer number of people require some manners that most Americans, used to plenty of parking spots and empty seats, might find uncomfortable.
Some things don’t change though. You still ignore your neighbor. It’s just that you do it from a distance of inches rather than yards.
One other interesting point about today—we finally have some clear skies again. Over the weekend, pollution reached dangerous levels. Today the sky’s just beautiful. I hope it will last.
Oh and about the photo, that’s not a shot of the streets here during lunch. That’s soho (South of Hollywood street) in the evening on a not-too-busy day.
§Commentary
The way you describe the lunch seating makes it sound German.
Which amuses me, because when I read German books about Chinese culture, I identify with the way the Chinese are described, and wish that someone would tell Germans the same things about Americans.
Hey there -
I’ve scoured your website(s) for email addresses and don’t seem to be getting anywhere, so I’m leaving a comment in the hope that one of you has the time to reply to me. To cut a long story short, I’m moving to HK at the end of November and ideally I’d like to end up living on Lamma. I’ve only briefly been to HK, en route to the Philippines a few months back, but am fairly certain that sanity would rapidly go out of the window if I lived anywhere BUT Lamma - I’m a Brit used to having a spot of green around and cannot get my mind around the idea of being slotted somewhere into a fifty storey high-rise. Anyhow, I was hoping on organising some accommodation before I got out there in order to reduce stress levels ever so slightly but this is looking increasingly unlikely; my question to you guys is, basically, how easy is it to get accommodation on Lamma? I’m hoping to stay below HKD5000 including all bills etc. - either a studio, one bed, or sharing. I’ve been attacking Google over the last weeks and getting no answers to these basic questions so thought I’d throw them at you on the offchance you have a few minutes to spare some evening…
I’d greatly appreciate any info you can give - even if it is just, ‘getting an apartment here is well nigh impossible, give up now and start resigning yourself to high-rise hell.’ My email address is janethomas_uk@hotmail.com, and thank you very much for anything you can send over in my general direction. I hope this isn’t too random or disconcerting a message to receive, I’m not entirely sure how to offer online credentials as such but hopefully you won’t pass me off as a particularly crazed individual. Hm. Thanks again, and best wishes.